I stopped by to pick up the rocker box covers today. The polishing is excellent, all of the scratches are gone, but the chroming’s a little off. The top covers don’t have good coverage in the deep parts. It’s clear that it was dipped instead of immersed. If I were building a custom this would have been an issue, but with my goals it’s fine. I’ll clean them up later.
Author Archives: Pat
Wow!
I got the slides and prints back today and am completely blown away by how good the slides came out. I’ve got a reprint of one of them on order and am scanning the rest now. It looks like the scanner’s colors are off quite a bit since flowers which on the slides are vibrant purple are coming out blue, but they’re all up in the gallery now. I guess I’m going to have to add a good professional slide and film scanner to the shopping list.
But, that being said, these are without a doubt the best pictures I’ve ever taken. I know now how much I’ve got to learn and that I can do better.
Dallas Arboretum
I decided to head out to the Dallas Arboretum with a few friends today to really try out the new lens and some good film. I shot my first roll of slide film, Fuji Velvia 100, and a roll of Kodak’s Ultra Color 100 negative film. I’m a little concerned over how the Velvia’s going to turn out, because I took every shot in manual mode and am trusting the camera’s light meter to do the right thing.
The Arboretum itself was beautiful. Load of flowers in every color of the rainbow, well tended grounds, and great walking paths. I’m definitely going to go back when the seasons change for some variety.
My APRS Tracker Is Back On The Air
I managed to break the feed line for my APRS station’s antenna, it disconnected from the connector while I was loading the Jeep up for the drive up to Illinois in December. I’ve been a little bit of a slacker and haven’t gotten around to fixing it. Well, on the way home from work today I stopped off at Tanner Electronics and picked up the parts I needed to get a new connector on the feed line. After a quick spin around the block to make sure the transmitter was still working I buttoned everything up and am able to send position reports again.
Canon 17-40mm f/4L
My new Canon 17-40mm F/4L lens arrived today, a day earlier than I’d expected. It’s replacing the 28mm f/2.8 prime because I was feeling pretty limited in my wide angle choices. I’m going to run a roll or so through it to start getting a feel for how it performs before heading out to do some landscape shooting this weekend.
V for Vendetta
I got together with some friends to go see V for Vendetta tonight. First off, I haven’t read the graphic novels that it’s based on, and I understand that there is a little bit of a controversy with regards to the author asking for his name to be removed from hte credits because of some disputes with the studio. But in spite of that it was a very good movie with an extremely powerful message. It kept my attention from start to finish and I’m going to try to find a copy of the graphic novels so that I can get the whole story.
Chroming The Rocker Boxes
I dropped the rocker boxes off at Hands Off Polishing in Garland today. They don’t have a website but if you’re looking for someone to do some chroming or polishing, give them a shout at 972-487-8220. They quoted me a two week turnaround and a reasonable price for the work. That two week timeframe is going to cut it close with the rest of the work, but I think the results will be worth it. Now I need to pick up some chrome bolts to put those rocker box covers back on with.
Heads Dropped Off
The heads have been dropped off at Evolution Bike Works for the valve job. Paul suggested that I check out a different chromer so I’ll be giving them a call tomorrow to see if I can get the rocker box covers chromed. Powder coating the middle one to match the paint is not going to happen, so I’m just going to chrome all three.
Petmate Electronic Portion Control Le Bistro
The new feeder for the girls came in today. It’s a Petmate Electronic Portion Control Le Bistro. The unit is pretty solidly built, with a cover over the clock and programming controls. Programming it isn’t difficult provided you follow the directions. I’ve got it set to dispense the same amount of food twice a day and will be trying to see if I can get it to dispense different amounts instead of all the same amount.
The girls are getting used to it, but there’s food in it so I don’t think they’ll take too long.